Ecolab (NYSE:ECL) Updates Q2 Earnings Guidance

Ecolab (NYSE:ECL) issued an update on its second quarter earnings guidance on Tuesday morning. The company provided EPS guidance of $1.62-1.72 for the period, compared to the consensus EPS estimate of $1.54. Ecolab also updated its FY 2024 guidance to 6.400-6.700 EPS.

Analyst Ratings Changes

Several equities analysts have recently issued reports on ECL shares. Wolfe Research started coverage on Ecolab in a research report on Friday, March 1st. They set a peer perform rating for the company. Bank of America raised Ecolab from an underperform rating to a neutral rating and raised their price target for the company from $185.00 to $216.00 in a report on Tuesday, January 16th. Robert W. Baird upped their price objective on shares of Ecolab from $232.00 to $243.00 and gave the stock a neutral rating in a report on Wednesday. Barclays raised shares of Ecolab from an equal weight rating to an overweight rating and raised their target price for the company from $225.00 to $260.00 in a research note on Wednesday, February 28th. Finally, Mizuho raised shares of Ecolab from a neutral rating to a buy rating and upped their price target for the stock from $216.00 to $260.00 in a research note on Friday, April 12th. Eleven investment analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and eight have issued a buy rating to the company’s stock. Based on data from MarketBeat.com, Ecolab currently has an average rating of Hold and a consensus target price of $233.65.

Ecolab Stock Up 0.3 %

NYSE:ECL traded up $0.73 during trading hours on Friday, hitting $227.49. 1,068,171 shares of the stock traded hands, compared to its average volume of 1,213,130. The firm has a 50 day moving average price of $224.51 and a 200 day moving average price of $202.54. The firm has a market cap of $65.04 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 42.13, a PEG ratio of 2.58 and a beta of 1.09. Ecolab has a fifty-two week low of $156.72 and a fifty-two week high of $231.86. The company has a current ratio of 1.41, a quick ratio of 0.95 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.92.

Ecolab (NYSE:ECL) last posted its quarterly earnings results on Tuesday, April 30th. The basic materials company reported $1.34 earnings per share for the quarter, beating the consensus estimate of $1.33 by $0.01. Ecolab had a return on equity of 20.56% and a net margin of 10.01%. The firm had revenue of $3.75 billion for the quarter, compared to analyst estimates of $3.74 billion. During the same period in the previous year, the firm earned $0.88 earnings per share. Ecolab’s quarterly revenue was up 5.0% on a year-over-year basis. Equities research analysts anticipate that Ecolab will post 6.55 earnings per share for the current year.

Ecolab Announces Dividend

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Monday, July 15th. Shareholders of record on Tuesday, June 18th will be paid a $0.57 dividend. The ex-dividend date of this dividend is Tuesday, June 18th. This represents a $2.28 annualized dividend and a yield of 1.00%. Ecolab’s dividend payout ratio is presently 42.22%.

About Ecolab

Ecolab Inc provides water, hygiene, and infection prevention solutions and services in the United States and internationally. The company operates through three segments: Global Industrial; Global Institutional & Specialty; and Global Healthcare & Life Sciences. The Global Industrial segment offers water treatment and process applications, and cleaning and sanitizing solutions to manufacturing, food and beverage processing, transportation, chemical, metals and mining, power generation, pulp and paper, commercial laundry, petroleum, refining, and petrochemical industries.